Emails from the Edge; Security Blanket Linux

(3 is such a nice number, why not put up 3 emails from my Peninsula Pal today)

Hey morrie;

There's a boatload of indications - stuff I would love to write on but my time of nuglet batting has come to an end. That does not mean, however, I can't share a few observations with a friend:

You'll notice the Microsoft blogs like Mary Jo and Baby Joe have also gone quiet. Not much to write on these days, I suppose. SilverLight is getting ripped up by developers who are discovering there's no data binding capabilities - you can't even hook SilverLight up to .Net automation without a whole lot of fabrication ... SilverLight (just like Vista turned out to be) is just another pretty face with no actionable substance behind it (a pretty face that can't dance is a wallflower - all the "ugly" girls out there on the dance floor will laugh laugh laugh).

Meanwhile, notice Adobe is moving to hook up Apollo with .Net to build web applications employing third-party packages... something Microsoft is not able to do STILL after VCSY NOW Solutions emPath demonstrated (years ago) .Net can be made to do anything... as long as you know (or have permission to know) how.

What broke Microsoft's leg? Or were they perpetually lame? and now that all the folks who have been working in the shadows all this time are fielding next generation products, Microsoft finds itself with a bad case of the programmer's polio: a lawyer latched on to the ankle like a soup-bone.

As someone else pointed out, June 30 is the projected issue date for the new Linux license (GPLv3) which says if you acquire a license coupon from Microsoft to use Novell Linux, under the GPLv3 license you automatically have open right to any interconnected IP Microsoft has attached to Novell.

Novell has already said if the GPLv3 says so they will drop the Microsoft license like a hot potato so Microsoft will be right back in the corner unable to interoperate with anything other than their own software base. The Linux world will walk away with all third-party interoperation AND .Net interoperation. Microsoft will be unable to get off the island.

So, Microsoft has not one (settle with VCSY) but two looming deadlines in that any slip-up putting them over the (assumed June 30) GPLv3 issue line opens their intellectual properties to the open source movement ex facto pickelo.

This could be a case where the Microsoft Lawyers and Intransigent Management will outsmart their own engineering and user base. What a hoot to watch all this unfold. More fun than watching a rodeo clown getting twirled like pizza dough.

Tough place to find yourself in. Any delay will be devastating to Microsoft as the Longhorn Reloaded bunch and the Retrophase bunch are already demonstrating they can field LongHorn capabilities WITHOUT having access to windows source code. They simply take a compiled code build (they could take a new copy of open-Vista if they desire once Microsoft flubs the June 30 deadline) and use the existing internal hooks any com developer would use to interact with the compiled code to hook up a virtualized shell around the windows code (no need to violate, just appropriate. kind of like picking up a brand new 'Vette you find parked on the skreet, hoist it up on your flatbed and then you can tool around in your Freightliner/Sleeper cab with a Vette chained down for the main chick magnet. Nifto cleano. Now you know why Microsoft hasn't come down hard on the Reloaded or Retro guys. Microsoft can't virtualize Vista but they can't stop others from doing it with the tools available in any number of the newly "discovered" capabilities of dynamic managed language.

That's a real big bad pickle jar to find your proprietary kingdom cucumber in. The Longer Microsoft Lawyers wait, the more of a beating Microsoft Marketing takes. The longer Microsoft Management dithers, the more Microsoft Engineering gets diddled. The longer Microsoft Engineering blushes, the more Microsoft Partners and Developers get screwed... and not even a kiss.

Those who have been reading the technology scene for the past few weeks recognize the scenery. IBM can (IBM can do anything now and they've demonstrated and are selling what Microsoft could only talk about years ago [still can't do- only talk. talk tallk talk yak yak yak). Adobe can (Adobe's even hooking up .Net just like Now Solutions did with emPath). Sun can (now that they're away from Microsoft). Others out there can but Microsoft, oddly enough, can not. they can only promise as they've promised many times before.

Ballmer's big scary patent litigation threat is being laughed at and sidestepped out in the open. Microsoft has no protection from virtualization so Vista will be owned by open-source wrappers if it goes on much longer than this. If it goes past June 30 everything Microsoft has will be open game to the Linux crowd who can out-sue Microsoft's entire cadre of legal resources. Kind of like a big fat bellowing cow eaten alive by fireants.

One other useful bit of information. The number of viewers on the #2 site spiked from 350 to 775 in one day. After that, the number went back down to 350 but the bandwidth numbers are way up.

I suspect there are 400 sophisticated viewers who visited the site that day (this past wed) and selected the RSS feed instead of coming back too the site. This means we have a party of people who are hooked in and silent so far. Don't know what that means for trading on the stock. Just an interesting population swell. Swell.

The desperate BS about patent invalidation LOL... will Microsoft be able to have VCSY's patents invalidated before June 30? OK How about before July 15? No? So what's THAT wishing and hoping all about? Giving the impinged troops a morale boost? HA

Looks like Microsoft has only one card left to play and that's to settle. If it goes on longer (like suppose the additional 400 swells to 4000? Swell) there won't be one "journalist" in the country who won't be able to draw a very nice and revealing picture of Microsoft standing there in Ballmer's underware before June 30. After that, the independent fireants take Office and Vista and make a truly usable ecology out of the duly purchased "products" and Microsoft is cut out of the virtualization game as they end up having to fight for years in the courts for the VCSY license (why would VCSY give them a license after June 30? Would the license cost not go up astronomically from VCSY's point fo view after that day?

No bad competition. Just "hardball" like Mister Ballmer likes to play. A real hardball so fast the radar gun will give a puff of smoke off to signal to all the baseball fans around the world... Mighty Casey has struck out.